In the ivy bower disconsolate; Of this azure Italy. Mary dear, come to me soon, I am not well whilst thou art far; O Mary dear, that you were here! PASSAGE OF THE APENNINES. LISTEN, listen, Mary mine, To the whisper of the Apennine; It bursts on the roof like the thunder's roar, Or like the sea on a northern shore, Heard in its raging ebb and flow By the captives pent in the cave below. Is a mighty mountain dim and gray, Which between the earth and sky doth lay; And the Apennine walks abroad with the storm. ON A FADED VIOLET. THE colour from the flower is gone, Which like thy sweet eyes smiled on me; The odour from the flower is flown, Which breathed of thee and only thee! A withered, lifeless, vacant form, I weep-my tears revive it not; STANZAS, WRITTEN IN DEJECTION, NEAR NAPLES. THE sun is warm, the sky is clear, The waves are dancing fast and bright, Blue isles and snowy mountains wear The purple noon's transparent might: The breath of the moist earth is light, Around its unexpanded buds; Like many a voice of one delight, The winds, the birds, the ocean floods, The City's voice itself is soft like Solitude's. I see the Deep's untrampled floor With green and purple sea-weeds strown; I see the waves upon the shore, Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown I sit upon the sands alone, The lightning of the noon-tide ocean Is flashing round me, and a tone Arises from its measured motion, How sweet! did any heart now share in my emotion. Alas! I have nor hope nor health, And walked with inward glory crowned Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure. Others I see whom these surround; Smiling they live, and call life pleasure; To me that cup has been dealt in another measure Yet now despair itself is mild, Even as the winds and waters are; I could lie down like a tired child, Which I have borne, and yet must bear, My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony. Some might lament that I were cold, They might lament-for I am one Whom men love not, and yet regret, Unlike this day, which, when the sun Shall on its stainless glory set, Will linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory yet. December, 1818. SONG FOR TASSO. I loved-alas! our life is love; But when we cease to breathe and move, I do suppose love ceases too. I thought, but not as now I do, Keen thoughts and bright of linked lore, The dregs of such despair, and live, And if I think, my thoughts come fast; Sometimes I see before me flee A silver spirit's form, like thee, Till by the grated casement's ledge THE PAST. WILT thou forget the happy hours Which we buried in Love's sweet bowers, Heaping over their corpses cold Blossoms and leaves instead of mould? Forget the dead, the past? O yet There are ghosts that may take revenge for it; 'Memories that make the heart a tomb, Regrets which glide through the spirit's gloom, And with ghastly whispers tell That joy, once lost, is pain. |